Upended
by LadySilver
Summary: A series of unrelated ficlets fulfilling prompts for the AU Bingo game on LJ.
1. If Not One Thing

_A/N: I'm participating in an AU Bingo challenge on LJ. All entries will be uploaded to this "story" as separate chapters, unless they are long enough to merit their own stories. All the stories will be AU in some way and to varying degrees of crackiness. Comments and constructive criticism are always welcome._

**If Not One Thing**

"No freaking way!" Stiles exclaimed. He fell into the closest chair, nearly missing and sliding the rest of the way to the floor but for Scott catching him by the back of the neck and hauling him into the seat.

"What?" Scott asked, looking back and forth between Stiles and the woman who had just stepped into his living room. Though she looked familiar, Scott couldn't place where he'd seen her before. She was in her early twenties, tall, with long dark hair hanging in loose waves around her face. Her skin was pale and flawless, almost glowing.

"Dude, you are so not going to be happy."

"What?" Scott repeated, now demanding. The woman was just standing there, staring at Stiles either like she was trying to decide between eating him and playing with him. So far, she hadn't given any indication of noticing the other teen in the room. He drew a breath, hoping his nose would reveal more information. She had no scent. None. A tingle crawled down Scott's neck, the hairs on the back standing up. He'd never met another person with no scent, and he really didn't like where that line of thinking had to go.

"Do you know where I can find Derek Hale?" she asked, polite as anything. "He wasn't at the house. But your scent was." She wore jeans and a t-shirt, both far too big for her. "And yours," she added, eyes cutting to Scott for the first time. One hand clutched the waistband of the jeans, keeping them from falling down. These weren't her clothes. That observation opened a whole new ream of questions that Scott didn't even want to speculate on.

Stiles closed his mouth, which had been gaping open, licked his lips. "No. He left." Shook his head. "But he'll be back," he added in a rush. "After he gets the whole Alpha thing figured out."

The woman's eyebrows creased, mouth turned down in a familiar grimace. "Alpha." She managed to pack of a lot of emotions into that one word, none of them positive.

Scott squeezed Stiles's neck, let his fingernails dig in just a little. Why couldn't his friend keep his mouth shut? He was spilling a lot of information to this stranger. Stiles reached back and swatted at his hand, only getting Scott to ease up, not let go.

"What happened to Peter?" she asked. Her top lip curled back, and now Scott caught a glimpse of elongated canines. Fangs.

"H-h-he's dead," Scott answered.

"How?"

"We killed him. B-b-burned him to death."

"Will that be enough?" Stiles asked suddenly. "Will he _stay _dead? Why didn't you stay dead? We _saw_ you. In pieces. How in holy hell is that myth the one with any validity?" By the end, his voice had risen to the point of cracking. His arms waved with every question. Only Scott's continued grip on him kept him from jumping out of the seat and stalking around the room. "Oh, shit. I'm sorry. I didn't mean to say _holy_—"

She snarled for real this time, revealing four sharpened canines. Her eyes burned ice blue. And now Scott was really confused.

"No," she replied. "It isn't enough. I'll find him and finish it. There's still time." She hitched at the pants, pulling them up. The movement revealed bare feet, dusty and caked with mud which she had tracked into the house. "It took me a month to come back."

"It takes a month? So the three day myth is wrong? You know, this completely changes the direction of my research." Stiles now grabbed Scott's hand and pulled it off his neck. His heart, which had been pounding, started to slow.

"The only reason to bury the pieces of the body separately is if you're _trying_ to prevent regeneration," she explained. She narrowed her eyes, which had now returned to a greenish hazel, like she was drawing conclusions she didn't want. "If you see my brother, tell him—"

"Uh-uh. No way," Stiles said, waving his hands in an X in front of his face. "I'm not being a messenger on this one." Now he stood up, started ushering her to the door. "The three day myth is a bust. So is the invitation one. That's fine. What about the blood drinking—you know what, I don't need an answer to that. How about you just leave now and go exact that revenge and leave us alone…."

Scott stopped listening at that point, lowered himself to the couch, his head braced between his hands. He didn't have the mythological background Stiles did; even if he'd done the research, he'd never be able to retain obscure information like his friend. But he'd managed to figure out two things, one of which was that they'd just been talking to Laura Hale, a woman whose death had initiated the chain of events that lead to Scott getting bitten. The second—

"Dude, _vampires_!" Stiles exclaimed, on returning to the living room. "Now we've gotta worry about _vampires_?" He sounded too excited, like the way he used to talk about werewolves before he started having regular near-death experiences because of them.

Scott fought to keep calm. He could feel the anger rising in him, the wolf keeping pace right behind. What had Stiles meant when he said that Scott _wouldn't_ be happy? Against his better judgment, he asked.

"Well, apparently I've been believing all the wrong things," Stiles said. He pulled the chair over to sit opposite Scott, their knees almost touching. "I'd been throwing out all the myths that are clearly nonsense, like a person being able to become a werewolf by drinking water out of a wolf's footprint. Or by turning around three times in front a mirror and visualizing the change really hard." Scott had a sinking feeling that Stiles had disregarded those myths because he'd tried them. He sighed, bit his tongue. He wasn't ready to press that issue. "Did you ever wonder what causes vampirism?"

Scott blinked, certain that he'd missed an obvious segue. It wasn't an unusual feeling when dealing with the way Stiles's brain worked. "No."

Stiles kneaded his lips and tongue, ran a hand over his head, obviously having no intention of not answering his question. "I'm a little fuzzy on the details." He took a breath, let it out. "When a werewolf is killed, it… doesn't exactly stay that way."

"Stay _what_ way? A werewolf? Or dead?" Scott kept his head down, tried to keep his voice calm. Nothing good would come of Stiles seeing his eyes right now.

"Um," Stiles answered. He went silent.

Scott swore.

END

_A/N #2: This entry fills square #25 (on the bottom left corner) of my card: vampires. The myth referenced herein is a real one._


	2. Duality

**Duality**

Maybe it's only because they had lived on the moon for several generations, long enough to forget the family history, that the Hale family even decided to join the colonial expedition to Mars. Laura tried to tell them not to go, that they were making a mistake. Her parents, of course, had no interest in listening to the protestations of a teenage girl. They decided that she just didn't want to leave her friends and booked the whole family on the first flight out without further conference. Only her uncle Peter seemed to take her seriously, but he deferred to his brother, claiming that, of the two elder Hale men, Laura's father was so alpha that there was no point in trying to talk him out of anything he'd set his mind to.

Laura next tried to convince her twin brother about the dangers of the family moving to Mars. "Haven't you _heard_ the family legends," she asked.

He rolled his eyes. "They're just legends," he responded. He looked out the treated plexiglass dome that covered their lunar colony; the gibbous Earth hung low on the horizon, its colors bright against the blackness of space. They both knew that when the planet was full, nothing would happen except that no one would be able to resist commenting frequently on the beauty of the Earthshine. "There's nothing to worry about-" he concluded. He reached out suddenly and grabbed the braid that she wore down her back, gave it hard yank. "—Except for how much time you're wasting with those old computer files." She shrieked, lashed out with her foot and kicked him in the thigh. Soon they were bouncing off the walls, wrestling like they were still kids. The conversation was forgotten.

On the big day, Captain Argent himself greeted them at the landing pad. Laura hung back behind the family. Her existing trepidation about the trip was only magnified by the way Argent kept looking at them, as if he didn't approve of their lifestyle and he was Not Going to Say Anything. Except, as far as Laura could tell, her family didn't appear any different than any other lunar family. As far as she knew, they weren't any different. Even she had started to find the family legends worthy only of mockery.

Uncle Peter, however, must have sensed the tension. He discretely pulled the captain aside and spoke to him in a way that apparently required lounging inside the captain's personal space. When Peter took his seat, he wore a small, satisfied grin. The captain didn't speak directly to them again. His younger sister Kate—whose ample chest Derek couldn't keep his eyes from—started to relay all the messages from Command. Laura was sure this hadn't been planned, though she would have plenty of time to wonder about it after they arrived, after the lander carrying her parents and extended family exploded above the red planet's surface. Freak accident, everyone said. Laura wasn't so sure. She'd heard a buried glee in Kate's tone when she presented the news. Only Peter survived, and he only technically. Modern medical technology might be able to keep his body alive, but it would never be able to heal his mind.

Her first day on her new home planet, she remembered. The legends had been specific and consistent. Hers was a special family, but the specialness required anger, focus, and some mystical quality of the moon. She had that anger now, was prepared to learn the focus. And Mars… Mars had two moons.

END

_A/N: Fulfills AU Bingo card square #19: **Alternate Planet(s)**_


	3. A Million and Six Times Better

__A/N: I always tell people not to apologize for their stories. But ... ::rests her head on the desk and weeps softly:: ... I'm so sorry...__

__**A Million and Six Times Better  
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Stiles and Scott stepped through the sliding doors into the backyard, all energy and high excitement about the brand new day that lay before them and its untapped possibilities. This is what summer vacations were all about: long stretches of daylight, beautiful weather, and the freedom to figure out for yourself how to make the most of it.

The two boys and their pet platypus wandered over to the tree that dominated their backyard. In the shade from its spread of leaves, they did their best thinking, helped with the tall glasses of iced lemonade dripping in their hands. No sooner had they settled up against the rough trunk, than the gate in the backyard fence swung open. In wandered Lydia, her hands clasped behind her back. She always looked a little surprised, a little uncertain, as if she wasn't quite sure how she had once again ended up at the McCall-Stilinski's. "Hi, guys," she called, one shoulder riding up in coyness, partially covering her mouth. "_What_cha do-ing?" Her gaze came to rest on Stiles, as it always did. She wasn't at all shy about her crush on him. Her only regret in life was that he hadn't noticed it back.

"We're going to have the best day ever," Stiles replied, as he always did. He fished an ice-cube out of the glass with his fingers and popped it into his mouth. Though he peered into the tree's canopy, his vision went a different direction.

In the house, Jackson paced in front of the window to his bedroom, shooting occasional death glares out to the yard where his brothers pretended to be oh so innocent about their devious plans. His best friend, Danny, lay sprawled on the bed, leafing through a copy of _Wired_ magazine. "I don't know what they're up to," Jackson snarled, "but I'm going to find out. I know they're hiding something, and when I figure out what it is, I'm going to bust them."

Danny turned a page of the magazine. Behind its cover, he rolled his eyes. Jackson was obsessed with busting his brothers when his energies could have been devoted to so many better causes—such as, for example, finally getting a date with that girl he had such a crush on. Allison, wasn't it? Some days Danny tried to use reason to get through to Jackson. Today, the sky was a bright blue, a few scattered clouds breaking up the glare, and the temperature was just this side of too warm to justify staying in the house. He decided to use a different tactic. "Let's go surfing," he suggested, feigning boredom with the idea. Jackson loved surfing. Just to sweeten the deal, he added, "Allison will be there. Probably in a bikini."

Jackson's paused mid-stride, one foot still in the air. "Bikini?" He glanced out the window again, but his brothers hadn't moved from under the tree. No edifices had appeared in the yard, nor mysterious construction equipment, pools of lava, giant robot heads. The only strange thing was that Lydia had joined the brothers under the tree and now had her own lemonade. "Let's go." If that's all they were going to do with the day, Jackson could afford to pursue his other obsessions.

"Scott," Stiles said suddenly. High up on one of the tree branches a squirrel hunkered, nibbling on something curled in its paws. "I know what we're going to do today." He punctuated his statement with a giant slurp of lemonade. Both Scott and Lydia turned to look at him, faces bright with anticipation. One never knew what to expect from Stiles's ideas except that they would be impossible, amazing, and the precise opposite of boring. "We're going to turn everyone into small, furry animals so we can see the world the way they do." He jumped up, already bubbling with ideas about what needed to be done to accomplish this.

Scott stood up a little slower. Reaching behind the tree, he retrieved the baseball bat he kept there. He knew his brother; while Stiles was a genius at coming up with plans, the work of building their machine would fall to Scott. And, if Scott'd learned anything so far on their summer vacation, it was that a well-aimed tap with a baseball bat could solve problems that no amount of troubleshooting could. While he did enjoy the building process, there was something to be said for enjoying the results of one's labors—the fewer unintentional side-effects, the better.

Stiles pulled his phone out of his pocket, made a few calls to the warehouse, and tucked the phone back, confident that the necessary supplies were ordered and on their way. Suddenly, he looked around. Scott was waiting, ready for his next set of directions. Lydia was on her phone to the Fireside Girls, explaining the plan to them. The boys' platypus, however, had, once again, vanished. Where _did_ he sneak off to all the time? "Hey," Stiles asked of no one in particular. He walked around the base of the tree, peered into its branches carefully, checked for tell-tale slumbering lumps in the yard. No sign of the monotreme anywhere. "Where's Greenberg?"

END_  
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_A/N#2: No … more … please … I-I-I … can't …. Owwww.  
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_A/N: Fulfills AU!Bingo square #14: Alt. Fandom: Western Cartoon: _Phineas and Ferb


	4. The Deal

_A/N: Comments and constructive criticism are always welcome._

**The Deal**

by LadySilver

Stiles's mother had never liked the snake. She only consented to it because his father had lobbied so hard, and she couldn't refuse him anything. The giveaway was when she started leaving Stiles's cleaned and folded laundry in a pile next to his door instead of putting it away like she had always done before. Other than refusing to enter his room, which is where he kept the terrarium, she never said anything. When he mentioned the reptile, which he liked to do because it was his first pet and he was the only one he knew who owned a boa constrictor, her cheeks went tight and her eyes lost their sparkle—but she never said anything.

So when she got sick and Stiles started cutting deals with any deity he thought might listen, the first thing he promised was that if she got better, he would get rid of the snake. To his eleven-year-old mind, it seemed like a fitting trade: one love for another. He first thought of taking the boa out to the forest preserve and letting it go free, but then he had a nightmare about being the boa, let loose in an environment it wasn't adapted for and couldn't understand, and he woke up with his chest constricting as if the snake had gotten free and decided to preemptively eat him for dinner. After that, he apologized to the snake, assured him that he'd seen the error of his thinking, and was extra careful about latching the lid on the terrarium.

The next time he went to the pet store for mice, he took a flyer he'd made himself offering the boa free to a good home and gave it to the clerk. The next time he went to the hospital, he brought flowers and a small box of candy (even though his mother couldn't eat it), and tried so hard not to bounce on the balls of his feet at the excitement of the news he wanted to give her, but couldn't yet.

They moved her to ICU and tried to stop him from visiting, but his dad fixed that.

No one called about the snake.

It was now clear to him that he had to uphold his end of the deal first, so he started talking up the benefits of snake ownership to the deputies at the police station: no fur (which meant no allergies), no paper training, no "accidents" on the floor to come home to after work. There were a couple of polite offers from people who could read between the lines, but Stiles could tell they didn't really mean it.

He found a pamphlet for something called Hospice behind the toaster. He read it, threw up in the sink, then loaded the snake into his carrier and bicycled to the pet store. The clerk squinted at him as if he thought he might have seen the younger boy before, but wasn't sure. Stiles dumped the carrier on the counter. "I have to get rid of my boa so my mom doesn't die," he said. In his head, the cause and effect was obvious. The clerk rolled his eyes, scoffed, and turned to deal with another customer who had come to the counter lugging a bag of bird food.

"I'm sorry, I couldn't help but overhear…" she said, waving off the clerk's attention. She asked the snake's name and listened as Stiles repeated his explanation for being at the store. She didn't even hesitate in her offer. "I work with a wildlife educational service," she explained. There was more, something about how the service toured schools and tried to broaden kids' knowledge of wildlife and exotic animals. Stiles didn't really listen to all of it; he had such a good feeling about her that he didn't need to. His snake went home with her. Maybe knowing that his pet was going to do something important made it a little easier.

His mom came home two days later, but not for hospice. The word everyone used was _miracle_, but Stiles knew better. He cleaned up his room, did the laundry and put it away without being asked, and didn't say anything. Ever.

Years later, she surprised him with an ad she'd cut from the newspaper. A wildlife educational show was touring the local elementary schools, and she thought they should go. The school was three towns over, the last night of winter break and he had to be up early for school, and really he was too old. But how could he turn her down?

One of the animals was his boa. The wrangler recognized Stiles right away when he went up for a picture. Not only did she refuse to take his money, but she invited him behind the scenes to see all the animals up close. He didn't know if the snake remembered him. Probably not. But a niggling worry he didn't know he'd been carrying vanished when he saw how big the snake had grown, how much care the wrangler showed in handling him, how much delight the kids got in seeing and learning about the creature.

His mother stayed in the audience seats until he was done, a smile playing on her lips.

When they got home from the show, his father was gone. The police had been called to the forest preserve to investigate a dead body that had turned up.

Stiles sat down on the couch with his mother. Between them lay the digital picture taken at the show of him with the boa draped across his arms. The camera had caught the snake with his tongue out next to Stiles's cheek, almost like a kiss. His mother's eyes sparkled as she touched the picture. "You really loved that boa," she said.

"Eh," he answered. "It was just a snake." He smiled at his mother, the satisfaction at the success of his secret deal warming him. He rested his head on her shoulder; she wrapped her arm around his back and pulled him close.

The moment said everything.

He went to bed early that night.

END

_A/N: For AU Bingo square #3: alt. history: someone didn't die._


	5. WereBlank

_A/N: With apologies to Scott for what I'm about to do to him..._

**Were-_**

"That is _not_ how it works," Derek proclaimed. He stood on the third stair from the bottom of the burnt out staircase in his burnt out house, the better to tower over Scott, despite already having a height advantage of several inches. His gray t-shirt was spotted with sweat from the workout that Scott had interrupted.

"Don't you think I _know_ that?" Scott replied, chopping at the air with his hands. He paced around the bottom of the stairs, careful to avoid the worst of the warping in the floorboards. Derek stared down at him, but Scott was oblivious, caught as he was in the turmoil in his head that had driven him to the point of approaching Derek at all. As a rule, he tried to avoid talking to the elder werewolf except when all other sources of information had failed, and this time definitely counted. "OK," he amended, still pacing, "I _didn't_ know that. I don't know what to expect about any of this." He gestured in a sweeping motion down his body, which was currently no more confusing than the typical teenaged male's body ever was. He wore worn jeans and a Beacon Hills High School t-shirt, and no one looking in on this conversation would guess that his body wasn't always human.

"Show me," Derek commanded. He backed up one step as if just now realizing that being too close to Scott might not be a smart idea.

"No!" Scott yelled. His voice cracked. "It's too embarrassing. All I know is that it's happening." He squeezed his eyes shut, scowled. "It's happening to _me_!"

Derek sighed, long and thick with frustration. "Fine," he said. "Did something happen? Did you get scratched or bitten again?"

Scott's eyes popped open in disbelief at the question. "I work at an animal clinic," he answered. "I get scratched and bitten all the time. Especially now." He gestured down his body again. His eyes already burned yellow. In the darkened shell of a house in the middle of the woods, only the fact that both boys had werewolf-enhanced vision meant that they could see at all. "Cats _really_ don't like werewolves," he pointed out.

Derek rolled his eyes. "Did you get scratched or bitten by anything _supernatural_?" he amended.

Scott shook his head, then dragged a hand through his hair. "No," he replied. "Nothing. I'd definitely remember that."

"And you're sure?" Derek asked. Scott heard the unspoken part of the question clearly: Are you sure you're not just overreacting? As if he didn't have a right to overreact. He wondered how Derek would feel if he woke up with … no. He couldn't even go there mentally.

"Of course I'm sure. I've never been so sure."

Derek backed up another step. The wood creaked loudly under his step, a punctuation to his retreat. Scott would have been offended if he wasn't wishing so strongly that he could be the one backing away slowly from the whole problem.

"Please tell me you've heard about this, that you know _anything_ about this," Scott begged. "Tell me the truth."

Derek blinked, opened his mouth, shut it again. "It happens sometimes," he finally admitted. "It's rare. Very rare."

"How do I stop it?"

"You can't." The words dropped like stones into the anticipatory silence that stretched between them. "It's a mutation. It's part of who and what you are now."

Scott sucked in a horrified breath. "So it's going to get worse? This isn't the end?"

Derek offered a silent, reluctant nod of confirmation, and raised his foot to retreat another step. He could trust the staircase to hold his weight, but he couldn't trust the safety of breathing the same air as Scott. That stung.

And that wasn't even the worst part. He'd have to tell Stiles, because if he didn't, Stiles would just figure it out on his own eventually, and then there'd be extra retribution for keeping secrets. As if the mockery he was already going to get wasn't bad enough. He'd have to tell Allison, and he couldn't even imagine what she would think of what was happening to him. And he'd have to wake up every day, not knowing…

His thoughts flashed to that morning. Though he was slowly gaining better control of his werewolf transformation, he still woke up partially shifted on occasion, each time more grateful than the last that he had the extra lock on his bedroom door so that his mother wouldn't walk in and catch him with glowing eyes, fangs, and sharp claws.

But, that morning when he woke up, the shift had been different. He'd known it before he recognized the specifics of what the differences were. His ears were wrong. His nose twitched, and he felt something strange on his upper lip where his face pressed into the pillow. He brought a hand up to the side of his head, and found not the usual pointy ear tip, but ears that hung down from his head, covered in a short, soft fur. They were definitely his ears. As he ran a hand over one, the fur bristled beneath his touch, and his nose twitched again.

"It only happens to those who are bitten," Derek continued, interrupting his thoughts. "If you have the right genes—" The _wrong_ genes, Scott mentally corrected. "—your body won't stop at werewolf. It'll keep collecting DNA and incorporating it…." He let the rest of the explanation taper off, as if even speaking the words was too painful.

"Every time?" Scott squeaked. Did that mean he already had more to him that what he'd already discovered? He hadn't been exaggerating when he said that he got bitten and scratched at work all the time. And, while it was true that most of the clientele was cats and dogs, more exotic pets often came through the doors. In the last couple months, he'd seen a bearded lizard, a variety of gerbils and guinea pigs, a couple snakes, and—obviously—rabbits. Nasty, vicious rabbits who lashed out at the werewolf who tried to change their bedding, completely belying the reputation of rabbits as being gentle and sweet.

Derek's expression was impassive, not a glare but stolid and unamused. At least he understood the gravity of the situation. Maybe a little too well. How bad was this going to get?

The question practically asked itself.

"Maybe you should quit your job," Derek suggested. "And stay away from other animals." Both suggestions were totally reasonable, but that didn't make them easier to swallow. Scott'd always liked animals, which was why he'd taken the job at the clinic in the first place. He could have gone for a job at the grocery store like everyone else did. Now he might have to, though that would have it's own problems, unless…

"So I'm not a werewolf anymore," Scott asked. He couldn't help the note of hopefulness that crept into the question. Working with those plastic bags would be difficult enough without random claws that got in the way.

Derek took another step backward. Where he'd started near the bottom in order to be intimidating, he'd now backed nearly all the way to the top, the reason for which was arguably more frightening than his original posture. "You're still a werewolf," he confirmed. "You'll still default to that form because it was your first one, and that's the form the full moon holds its sway over."

_Great_, Scott thought. _Just great. _So, he got to be a vicious monster at least one day a month and any other time he so much as slipped in his control. Unless other forces took over and he lapsed into one of his other forms, because it couldn't be enough to stop at being one kind of were-creature. It figured that he would screw this up, too. Did anyone else have to worry about being a food-chain unto themselves, he wondered? Did this mean that his instincts would really be at war with themselves? He turned away, unwilling to let Derek see the fear that he knew was written all over his face. He felt an itching on his upper lip, and realized with a quick glance up the stairs that it wasn't just _his_ instincts he was going to have to worry about, either—food-chains being what they were.

The stairs creaked again, the noise sharp and sudden. Scott couldn't help his reaction. He bolted for the front door before he even understood what he'd heard, and raced into the woods with powerful bounds. Only after he was miles away and his breathing slowed from its panicked staccato did he start to understand how badly his exit could have ended. With a groan, he sunk down into the clearing, and covered his head with his arms. The night sky was black and cloud covered, not even a star to light to the way. Not even a star to wish on. He didn't believe in that kind of superstition, but at this point he'd take any hope he could get for a cure. Never had he needed it more.

END

__A/N: ... and__ with apologies to Boy_on_Strings for what I did to Scott.  
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_A/N: Fulfills AU Bingo square #1: Mutant_


	6. Team Building

_A/N: Story contains a minor casting spoiler for season 2._**  
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**Team Building**

Coach Finstock assumed the first voice mail message was a practical joke of some sort and deleted it. If he punched the delete key a little harder than necessary, it was only because he didn't have the time or patience for this kind of idiocy. He was a coach, true enough, and he liked to think of himself as a great coach. But he coached a developmental ice hockey team in the backwoods of northern California. He couldn't think of a single reason why anyone would legitimately want him coaching the USA Olympic team. Yeah, he had a couple of good players. OK, outstanding players. Miraculously, amazing outstanding players—even if they were prone to fighting. But, it was ice hockey: Fights on the ice were expected. There was a reason fans chanted about being at a boxing match where the occasional hockey broke out.

He deleted the second voice mail a few days later for the same reasons, shaking his head all the while. As far as jokes went, it wasn't funny. Some people just didn't know when to stop.

The next afternoon a padded envelope landed on his desk, part of an otherwise generic mail delivery. He picked it up and shook it, certain that he hadn't ordered anything. The contents rattled. He frowned and shook the package again. When he finally opened it, he found a box of brand name dog biscuits. A small note was also enclosed, handwritten, but not addressed or signed, informing him that he should consider using the biscuits as a training tool. Box clutched in his hand, he threw open the office door and peered out into the locker room, knowing that whomever sent the box would be lurking out there, waiting to have a good laugh at him.

The clang of the metal door bouncing off the wall reverberated through the empty room.

His footsteps echoed off the cement floor as he walked through the space, confirming that no one hid behind or in the lockers, no one had left any further "gifts."

Really, he told himself, he should have expected a practical joke like this to have occurred eventually. Maybe the surprise was how long it took. He'd been coaching the Wolves for six years, and when he'd started with them they had been the laughing stock of the conference. Had someone grown jealous of their success? Or was it just a fan who thought he'd come up with a clever comment?

Finstock shook his head, dismissing the thoughts, and dropped the box into his garbage before continuing through the rest of the mail.

Two days later a letter arrived explaining in formal language on expensive paper that he had been selected as a candidate for Olympic coach based on his qualifications with his team and his ability to work with their unique abilities. He read the letter over several times, growing more confused with each passing. His qualifications? _What _qualifications? His team had won the Division championship this last season, to be sure, but they'd lost the State tournament after all the starters got ill at the same time.

He crumpled the letter up and tossed it in the garbage as well. Someone had clearly made a mistake. Finstock was hardly a common name, but there had to be another one whom the committee clearly intended to tap. Considering how many developmental teams there were, and how many divisions across the country, if winning the Division was all it took to demonstrate competence to coach the Olympic team, then someone had a really wrong idea about what the Olympics were supposed to be achieving. He had too much respect for that level to give the offer any serious thought.

Another padded envelope arrived later that week. This one contained a small box with a whistle inside. And another handwritten note that suggested he trade in his old whistle. The whistle's metal shone in the flourescent lights from overhead, all shiny and new. He put it in his mouth and blew, curious as to what made this one so special. He heard nothing. From out in the locker room came a shrill yelp and the crash of a body slamming into lockers. Finstock ran the sequence of sounds back through his head. Yes, it had definitely happened in that order. Before he could go out to investigate, the phone rang. He stared at it, listening to the second ring and then the third. Just before the fourth, when the phone would click over to voice mail, he picked up the receiver.

"Finstock," he announced.

"Robert Finstock from Beacon Hills?" the voice on the other end inquired. A male voice, speaking the words with a precision of articulation that Finstock didn't often hear.

"Bobby," he corrected, automatically. He'd never been Robert; he wasn't even sure why his parents had burdened him with the formal name since, to the best of his recollection, they'd never used it. Even when they were angry, in those situations where other kids got their full names trotted out, he was still just Bobby.

A soft sigh came down the phone line, one that carried a relieved smile. "I'm delighted to have finally caught you," the voice replied. "I presume you have received our letter and coaching aids...?"

"Yeah," Finstock answered, tone heavy with suspicion. He set the whistle down on his desk and eyed it. What was the point of a whistle that didn't work?

"And I further presume that you have some concerns about the veracity of the offer." This time the speaker didn't frame a question.

"Look, if this is some sort of joke-" Finstock began, ready to get his ire up. He wasn't yet there. A part of him wanted to believe what the letter had to say. Coaching the Olympic team? What a dream come true that would be! Up until that first phone call, it was a dream so distant that he didn't even know he had it. He'd always told himself that he has happy working with the developmental league.

"I assure you, this is no joke," the voice interrupted. "If you'll allow me to explain..." And he did. There were words used like _discrimination_ and _minority rights_ and _rebalance_. There were words that weren't used, but ones Finstock heard anyway, like _retribution_ and _guilty parties_. The speaker claimed that he represented a sort of Political Action Committee who wanted to see some changes to public perception, and they had targeted athletics as one avenue toward this goal.

Finstock pulled the phone away from his ear during the spiel and stared at the receiver. Was he really expected to believe all this? He started to hang the phone up, then tsked to himself. What was the harm in listening?

Finally a break came, a lull in the monologue where he was clearly supposed to say something. He pursed his lips, shuffled some papers around on his desk, searching for inspiration. "I'm not certified," he pointed out.

"Leave it to us to navigate the hoops," the speaker responded. He had apparently expected that argument. There was a pause, then a large exhalation across the phone line. "The truth is, we're really interested in several of your players..."

Finstock started to ask which ones, but cut himself off as he realized exactly whom the speaker referenced. After a big turnover on the team two years back, Finstock had resigned himself to needing to rebuild, his overall expectations pinned on Jackson and Danny. They were great players, but not enough to carry a whole team. Then Scott had blossomed practically overnight, had gone from dead weight that Coach kept around to maintain numbers to the best winger he'd ever worked with. Shortly after that, a similar transformation happened to Isaac. Then, as if the water was laced, Jackson and Danny shot to a new level with their skills. All of them had agility and reflexes that professional players could only fantasize about.

If Finstock hadn't known better, he would have sworn that the boys were all on steroids, though he had never seen steroids work that quickly, to that extreme, or without leaving any trace in the system. He couldn't have begged, borrowed, or stolen a better first line. The only issue was that none of the boys had any anger management skills, and they all seemed to have an intense, constant rivalry with each other. He'd had to learn quickly how to control them, redirect them, focus them. It took a few practices, but he'd started to figure it out.

"And you want me because..." He left the question open. He'd always hoped that one of the players he coached would someday get tapped to play on the Olympic team; he'd never imagined that four of them would be, especially _while_ he was still coaching them.

"You have a rare gift," the speaker replied. "Most people of your first line's … _persuasion_ … wouldn't respond to a mere human. We believe you have a lot of potential."

Pursing his lips, Finstock considered what he was being told, and struggled to fill in the blanks. He had always prided himself on his observational ability-a decent coach had to build on the strengths of the players in front of him, which meant identifying them correctly, even if those strengths were still latent-but he'd obviously been missing some important details. He glanced at the garbage can next to his desk. It was empty, but he remembered the box that had crinkled the plastic lining days before. Then he picked up the silent whistle and turned it over in his hand. His assumptions about who his players were and what they were capable of crumpled under the weight of the new ideas formulating in his head.

"So … the Olympics?" he asked, just to make sure he'd heard correctly. Nothing like starting big. He could appreciate _cohones_ like that. If he'd figured out what he thought he'd figured out, that would be the beginning of the adventure, not the end. The wall next to his desk was cinderblock, painted an eggshell color. He had a couple of certificates and plaques mounted on it from the previous wins he'd helped the team to, but rather than seeing them with the wall in the background, he suddenly saw the wall as the vast expanse of emptiness it was, broken only by the handful of awards. He wouldn't mind filling that space up, wouldn't object at all to seeing that eggshell paint disappear under photographs and trophies. And, if he was helping someone else toward a greater good, so much the better.

"I thought you'd see things our way with enough persuasion," the voice spoke. "We'll be sending over a new assistant for you: my nephew. He can answer any of your questions."

The call came to an end and Finstock hung up the phone. He pulled the old whistle off the faded lanyard he'd had it strung on and replaced it with the new one, already mentally making the adjustment from one lucky whistle to another. The dog biscuits? Certainly he could get a supply of those from the grocery store; if not the regular one, then maybe that upscale market on the other side of town. He glanced at the calendar on his desk just to verify that this was a good part of the month to introduce some new training methods. He already had several ideas hatching.

He wasn't at all sure about what he'd just agreed to, but Bobby Finstock had never been one to reject a challenge. And if coaching the Olympic team was what he was destined to do, then he'd make sure that the players he was bringing with him were ready to be unleashed.

* * *

><p><em>AN: Fulfills AU Bingo square #17: Olympics_


	7. Absent All Else

**Absent All Else**

"Do you remember what it was like after Stiles was born?" Melissa asked. She glanced at the playing cards in her hand, shuffled the order of a couple of them to make it easier to see what she held. The wooden chair on which she sat was hard and an ache had started in her lower back from the lack of cushion, but she felt herself in no position to complain, all things considered. Instead, she hoped to distract herself from thinking about it with conversation.

Sheriff Stilinski looked up from his own cards, a tired, reminiscent smile playing around his lips. "You mean the part about not getting a full night's sleep for two years?" He sat in a much more comfortable chair. He'd offered it to her, but she'd declined, not for the least reason that she didn't want to be a coddled woman. She'd never been good at playing that part.

"Two years?" she asked, surprised. Scott had slept through the night at barely a month old. By two months she already had to argue with him about waking up. Funny how early habits revealed themselves.

"We couldn't keep him full. The kid was always hungry. Sarah started adding cereal to his bottles long before the doctors cleared him for food. We're lucky he didn't turn out to be allergic to anything."

Melissa gave her head a slight shake and drew a new card from the stack. It didn't help her hand, so she flipped it onto the discard pile right away. "Actually, I was thinking about how they completely rewrote everything: the things you noticed, the things you thought about, the things you valued as important. I remember how before Scott was born, we were so worried about what time TV shows were on and whose turn it was to take care of the laundry. And after, we talked about poop and spit-up the way our colleagues traded gossip on who was having an affair with whom."

"How many diapers did the baby use; what color was the poop; how often had he pooped?" The Sheriff chuckled. "Yeah, I remember those conversations. I remember being so relieved that I could go to work every day just to think about something that wasn't expelled from my child." He drew a card, started to discard it, then sucked in a breath. "Well, I'll be," he spoke, under his breath. Adding the card to his hand, he shuffled others around, threw a King of Diamonds on the discard, and knocked on the surface of the long, wooden table that doubled as the registration desk at the Old Jailhouse Museum. It was pitted and scarred with age and use, looking a lot like Melissa felt most days. An outdated computer hunkered on the far end. Sheriff had pushed it and a stack of promotional paperwork out of the way so that they would have room to play while they waited.

Melissa pulled another card and, again, promptly tossed it away. All she could do at this point was reduce how much her hand cost her, and drawing Jacks was not going to help. She sighed and watched as Sheriff set his hand down. He had a straight run of high Diamonds ending on the Jack. He must have been waiting for the Queen until he pulled whatever card it was that rounded out his hand. Her hand was all fives, save for an errant eight that she hadn't been able to get rid of. "You win again," she said, pushing the eight out from the rest of her cards so he could see it and calculate the right number of points against her. Not that she thought he'd cheat, but it was better to be cautious. "I think I'm going to check on them." She started to stand up, one hand going to her lower back. Her knees popped. "I swear I'm not old enough to feel like this," she added, not expecting an answer.

"You're not," Stilinski replied with a leading smile. He stacked the cards together and picked them up to shuffle. The deck looked so small in his large hands. "You've just been sitting too long." He thunked the cards back onto the table. "We've both been sitting too long." He stood up too, his blue eyes crinkling with a suppressed wince. He shook his head.

Melissa glanced at the clock mounted above the registration area, the cheap plastic device proclaiming that the two adults hadn't been sitting that long at all. As a youth, she had easily been able to stay up all night long and go on with the next day with little or no penalty. As a woman who saw forty coming on far too quickly, she noted the time at just after nine pm and felt a yawn pull itself up from deep inside her. She slapped a hand over her mouth before Sheriff could get a good look at all her fillings and thought wryly about what a strange first date this was. Her eyes widened as the thought flitted through her head again. First date? Where had that come from?

Stilinski had already moved toward the arched doorway that led from the main room toward the part of the building where the cells were housed. He hesitated at the threshold, either waiting for her or simply unable to take the step over it.

The wall next to the archway held a long glass display case in which sat the rusted remains of manacles and chains, the faded pictures of famous inmates and less-famous punishment devices, and yellowed pages from newspapers and diaries extolling the heinous crimes that had been retributed in these walls. The two parents had spent a long time standing in front of that display case, doubting what they had agreed to do. Their hands had been clasped together in mutual support. Few parents wanted to see their sons in prison. Never had Melissa or Stilinski imagined that they would have insisted on it.

A scream tore down the hallway, accompanied with the clanking of chains. Another scream, higher pitched but no less anguished, joined in. Melissa swallowed a groan of protest at what she was hearing. Her eyes found Stilinski's; his were already on her. In their depths she saw relief that he hadn't had to be here alone. She couldn't agree more. She'd tried—and she knew she would have figured out a way if it had been necessary—but she couldn't imagine how she would have been strong enough to help Scott through this by herself. Worse, how she would have been strong enough to help Scott if his father had still been in the picture.

Stilinski nervously hooked his thumbs into the belt loops of his jeans. The stance and shell-shocked expression on his face took Melissa back to the first day of Kindergarten. She had seen him then, standing under the marching row of anthropomorphic alphabet letters that decorated one wall, with the same stance, same expression. She didn't know then which child was his amongst the two dozen similarly sized children tearing around the room, though she would learn quickly enough. She had taken pity on the man, the only father in a room of half-panicked mothers and over-excited children, and walked over to introduce herself. This gesture saved both of them from heart-attacks when five-year-old Scott, who had nearly given himself an asthma attack over the notion of being away from his mother for a whole day, had blithely accompanied Stiles home from school. Because of that introduction, Stilinski knew whom to call, and they both shared a good laugh over their sons' instant bonding.

"If you would have asked me a month ago, I would have said I had this parenting thing figured out," Stilinski said in an obvious effort to infuse some humor into the situation. Gallows humor, Melissa realized. What an appropriate phrase for where they were.

The absurdity of the situation struck Melissa and she huffed out a laugh that sounded too much like a sob. She tugged at the ponytail she'd dragged her unruly hair back into earlier, tightening it or loosening, she wasn't sure which. It was something to do with her hands while she turned away and composed herself. When she had control of her voice, she replied, "Spoken like someone asking for trouble," trying to keep her tone light, and mostly failing. At least, she wasn't fooled. Stilinski was too polite to give away what he thought. The screams from the prison cells started again, became more sustained, broken only by the desperate gasps of air that sustained them. Softer, she continued, "Every time I thought I knew what I was doing with Scott, the rules would change." She raised an eyebrow at that, as if first steps, first words, and first werewolf transformations were somehow on the same linear progression of normal child development. Later, she would probably think back on what she'd said, what she'd thought, and cringe; but right now, everything was so ridiculous that nothing was.

Stilinski offered a shrug, a slight raising of his shoulders as if not sure how to commiserate without turning the conversation into a one-upmanship. "At least that's consistent," he commented darkly. She wondered specifically what he was thinking of. For all the struggles she'd had with Scott, she recognized that she had gotten a pretty easy-going kid. Stilinski no doubt had a bookful of stories about his own parenting challenges, ones she would be sure to ask about in the upcoming months. It would give them plenty to talk about.

"You ready?" Stilinski asked. He held out his hand for her to take again, and she did. She didn't want to walk down this hallway alone. Its stone walls were dark and stained with time and the smoke of countless cigarettes. The few bulbs hanging from the ceiling were inadequate to light the place once the sun had gone down, after visiting hours were over. A red EXIT sign hummed at an emergency door at the other end of the hall, a much later addition to bring the old building up to code for a tourist attraction. No, she wasn't ready. But, since when did readiness matter for any of the challenges that came with being a parent?

They started down the corridor together, its breadth barely wide enough to allow the two of them to walk side-by-side. The clanging had increased, the rattling and shaking of caged animals desperate for freedom. Melissa squeezed Stilinski's hand, was relieved to note that his was damp. Those caged animals were their sons, two friends who had gone searching for innocent adventure in the forest preserve one night and had gotten bitten by a something that would turn out to be a werewolf.

Thank goodness for the old jailhouse with its barbaric chains, it underground cells, its iron doors—and its historical significance that provided enough funding to keep it maintained and not so much to advertise its presence. And the best part: As town Sheriff, Stilinski had the keys, a remnant of old tradition and law. The first moment after Scott told her what was going on when Melissa thought she could be the parent she needed to be was when Stilinski suggested imprisoning their sons for the night. She had wanted to punch him, then she wanted to hug him.

She drew a deep breath. Let it out. "Let's get this first over with," she said, barely able to hear herself. The air was thick with tension, and loud with the continued yelling and the crackling of bodies contorting and breaking.

"Did you bring a camera?" he murmured.

That, Melissa heard. Stilinski's weather-worn face darkened; he hadn't meant for his question to fall into one of the rare pauses for breath, hadn't meant to be heard at all. She wouldn't be the only one kicking herself tomorrow. Now she did punch him, slugging him lightly in the arm to show that she heard the statement for what it was. She appreciated the levity, and she understood immediately from where Stiles had inherited his sense of humor. "I don't think we need this one for the baby book," she responded.

Melissa and Stilinski reached the end of the corridor and the turn-off for the steps that would lead down to the cells, and both came to a stop. The light bulb above them flickered and the air smelled of dust, mildew, and hundreds of years of desperation and last chances.

"They're still our sons," Stilinski stated. She imagined that his thoughts were running down the same track as hers. What parent didn't wonder about who their child would become? That they were actually concerned about _what_ their children would become seemed irrelevant in the moment.

"They'll always be our sons," Melissa replied, giving voice to that thought. She had a feeling that this exchange was going to become a mantra, a necessary reminder for the two single parents who struggled to do the best they could in a realm of parenting that no _What to Expect_ book had ever covered. The simple statements of reality were the most powerful. She and Stilinski would be here every month, enacting the same routine, because it had never occurred to either of them not to be. People had met and bonded over far lesser commonalities of values and interest.

And, yes, she knew it was totally wrong of her to be thinking about that now, as her foot hovered over the first of the stone steps, their sons now howling together in an abandoned cell below them. If she had had to guess the one kid in that Kindergarten class that frustratingly sensitive Scott would form an indelible bond with, the hyperactive, inattentive, and frustratingly brilliant dynamo named Stiles wouldn't have made her top ten. There was nothing the two boys appeared to have in common. But, since when did friendship—or love—ever make any sense?

The sounds coming from the cells quieted at the first thunk of Stilinski's boot heel on the stairs. The boys knew their parents were coming and had switched from furious protests at their confinement to hushed anticipation. Melissa could hear their snuffles and the scrape of their feet against the rock floors. She idly wondered who would be waiting in those cells. Would werewolf-Scott still be quiet and emotionally intense? Would werewolf-Stiles still be garrulous and impulsive? As quick as the questions were born of her curiosity, she quelled them.

As she and Stilinski traversed down into the darkened stairwell together, she wasn't looking for metaphors to help her make sense of the turn her life had taken. That didn't stop her seeing them all around. The most important one was a simple reminder of what she had always done when reality had interfered with her well-meaning plans: It was to play the hand she had been dealt.

No matter how Scott grew and changed, she would never be able to see him without seeing the squalling, red-faced infant who had been placed on her chest sixteen years before, whose mere presence had redefined her life in every way possible. Likewise, a part of her would always see Stiles has the impetuous child racing through the Kindergarten classroom with his shoes untied, a pair of safety scissors clutched in one hand, and Stilinski as the overwhelmed father standing under a grinning M, trying so hard to convince himself that it was safe to leave his son and go home. She didn't know how they saw her. It didn't matter. The four of them were in this together, and they would get through this together, one full moon at a time.

END

_A/N: Fulfills my AU Bingo square #5: Prison_


	8. Negligent Lycanthropy

_A/N: Thanks to fountainxxpenny for help with this story and for supplying a title.  
><em>

**Negligent Lycanthropy**

Sheriff Stilinski should have known better than to walk into his son's room unannounced. There were all kinds of reasons why the father of a teenaged boy knew to let his son have his space, and those were just the normal reasons. Most fathers didn't have Stiles as their progeny and the hard-earned caution that resulted from that. Stilinski's defenses were down, his attention focused on the recent string of vandalisms that had been plaguing Beacon Hills. He was ready to drop into bed and sleep for a million years, but he'd decided to detour past his son's room first and at least acknowledge the kid's existence. He'd pushed open the door, the question about what to have for dinner already on his lips. "Stiles, what do you want—"

Stiles and Scott both bolted upright. Stiles had been laying stomach down on his bed. He jumped to a sitting position fast enough to make Jackie Chan envious. Scott had been crouched over, his fingers dug in his hair. He stood up, and turned away—but not before Stilinski caught the flash of yellow eyes and the mouthful of fangs in a barely suppressed snarl. He blinked and instantly regretted that he hadn't stayed at the station a few minutes longer.

"Dad!" Stiles yelled. He made a not-at-all-discrete waving motion with one hand as if trying to urge Scott to escape out the window. It didn't matter. Scott turned back, his eyes wide and brown, though now his face was burning red and he wore the guiltiest expression.

Sheriff Stilinski sighed, the weariness of his day all pouring into one exhalation. He hadn't seen what he'd seen, except for the minor point that he had. And he really should have known better. But long experience had taught him to trust his instincts, and right now his instincts were telling him not to make direct eye contact with the werewolf in front of him. "Scott," he said, speaking carefully so that he didn't spook the kid. "I hate to say this, but you're under arrest." His hand automatically went to his gun, which he hadn't even gotten as far as putting into the safe for the night.

Scott's jaw dropped. "What?"

Stiles didn't make a noise. His eyes were darting back and forth between his father and his best friend, like he was certain that one of them had planned this at his expense. He was gnawing on his lower lip.

"You're in violation of several Beacon Hills's town laws."

Scott threw his hands up in exasperation, obviously at a loss for words. "Which ones?"

Sheriff Stilinski wet his lips, never took his hand off his gun. How he hated needing to do this. Fortunately, he hadn't had to pull the gun yet. Not that the weapon would make any difference. He fought the urge to roll his eyes toward the ceiling. No matter that this was his son's _best friend_, a kid he'd known for most of his life, he still had to be somewhat professional. "It's against the law to be a werewolf within city limits," Stilinski explained.

Now both the boys were staring at him, wide-eyed and open-mouthed. He could feel their shock and the crashing pile-up of all the questions they wanted to ask. Stilinski felt a bead of sweat trickle down the back of his neck. "It's one of those laws that has been on the books forever and that no one has ever taken seriously enough to remove," he offered, by way of what little apology he could offer. _He_ certainly hadn't taken the law seriously. Oh, he'd had a good laugh about it back in the academy, along with all the other cadets. Then he'd promptly forgotten about it until he saw Scott. Even the animal attacks in town hadn't triggered the connection.

"You mean like the Minnesota law against crossing state lines while carrying a duck?" Stiles asked. His eyes brightened as he discovered yet another realm of useless knowledge that he was suddenly able to employ. "Or like the Wisconsin one about margarine—"

Stilinski cut his son off with a sharp look. "_Unfortunately_, it is still law, and I am charged with the task of upholding the law."

"How can there be a _law_ against being a freakin' werewolf?" Scott protested. He dragged a hand through his hair and dropped his head back, directing his next question at the ceiling. "How can I be a criminal for something I _am_ instead of something I _did_?" He groaned loudly. "My mom's going to kill me."

Stilinski shrugged and held out one hand toward his son. "Your handcuffs, please."

"Can't," Stiles replied. He bounced once on the end of the bed as if to punctuate his refusal. The Chemistry textbook and homework papers spread out around him rustled with the movement.

"Stiles," Stilinski warned. He was already too tired to deal with this crap. Another second and he'd have to trot out Stiles's full name, the threat of which already had Stiles's face scrunching up as if he saw a wrecking ball swinging his way and could do nothing except brace himself for impact.

"I used them. They're broken," his son explained. He indicated the empty place on the wall near his bed where the 'cuffs had previously hung. "Had to lock Scott up to a radiator somehow."

Stilinski's eyebrows danced up. "I'm going to pretend I didn't hear that," he said. "Failure to report a known werewolf is also illegal."

"So you're going to arrest me, but not him?" Scott cried. His pitch broke on the last word and he had to clear his throat before shooting an apologetic look at his friend. Stiles didn't usually need help getting into trouble, and he never needed Scott to lead him there.

"Do you have a concealed carry permit for those claws? What about the fangs?" Stilinski answered. Off Scott's baffled and affronted expression, he continued, "You've broken far more laws than Stiles has. Amazingly." Stilinski frequently found himself shocked that Stiles had made it this far into his adolescence without a juvenile record. It figured that getting him all the way through without some legal trouble would be too much to ask.

"Hey!" Stiles protested.

"You'll have to come with me—"

"Wait!" Stiles interrupted, leaping to his feet. The floor shook under the impact. "You can't do this. It's discrimination. Scott's never hurt anyone…." He looked like he was going to say more, probably add an exception that really wouldn't help the case he was trying to make. He stopped talking when he saw the way Scott was glaring at him.

Stilinski let his hand drop from his gun, let his shoulder slump under his exhaustion. "That's not for us to decide. I wish I could just let this go, pretend I never walked into the room tonight."

"Why can't you?" Scott asked, not unreasonably.

"Because when you get caught—and you will—questions will be asked. I can do more to protect you if I'm the good guy." He looked imploringly at his son, willing Stiles to get it, to make it make sense someplace other than in his head. Like most cops, Stilinski had gone into police work to be the good guy. All that attitude really did was make the tough decisions even tougher. This was the toughest one he'd ever had to face.

Stiles ran his hand up over the back of his head, his short hair bristling under the gesture. Finally he nodded, tipping his chin up at Scott in a tiny movement that only a decade of friendship imbued with meaning.

"I'll go with you," Scott replied, his implicit, unquestioned trust in Stiles making any further discussion moot. "On one condition." He held up a finger to still Stilinski before the Sheriff could point out that Scott didn't have any rights to name conditions. Not that he was going to point that out. Legalities aside, this was far from a normal arrest, and Stilinski felt he owed some concession to the boy who was practically his second son. "We stop by my house first so I can tell my mom what's going on. I don't want her to find out from the rumor mill."

Stilinski blinked, once again impressed by Scott's thoughtfulness.

"I'm going, too," Stiles chimed in. "Someone needs to keep everyone honest."

Stilinski swallowed a chuckle. Stiles's thoughtfulness was a little more suspect, but no less appreciated. "Deal," Stilinksi replied. He hesitated a little longer on the next part because it contradicted so much of what he'd just said and most of what he stood for. But, he knew Scott and he knew the teen would uphold his end of their bargain, which made bending the rules a little easier to justify to himself. "As soon as school's out tomorrow, I'll see you down at the station."

Without waiting for a response, he stepped back into the hall and shut the door behind him. As for dinner, he'd order the boys a couple subs and two-liters, get them fueled up. He could trust his son to make use of the evening, his new computer, and his mostly-untapped criminal talents. Stilinski smiled as he walked down the hall in search of one of the cordless handsets. The Beacon County Courthouse had no idea what was coming for them.

END

_A/N: Fulfills AU Bingo square #11: Criminals_


	9. Jump Through Hoops

**Jump Through Hoops**

Stiles followed Scott into his dressing room, letting the door slam shut behind them. Scott had shown up to work with his normal amiable mood, then for no reason that Stiles could discern, he'd turned suddenly angry and gone stomping off to his dressing room. Celebrities were known for their temper tantrums and unique whims; Stiles had heard more than a few horror stories about what other managers had to deal with, which only made him feel that being Scott's manager had somehow been too easy and that the breaking point, when it came, was going to ruin them both.

The room was a decent size—large enough to hold an overstuffed couch, a dressing table, a couple of straight-backed chairs, and a small kitchenette—with every inch of wall covered in posters of musicians and movies and athletes. None were of Scott or his roles, an observation that Stiles made afresh and with some shock every time he stepped through the door. "Come on, dude. You can't do this to us. You have to go on."

Scott threw himself onto the couch, arms already crossed in his most defiant pose. Like Stiles, he was wearing the bright yellow Staff shirt for the facility, though his pose covered the identifying words across his chest. "No," he proclaimed. "I'm done." He flopped back into the cushions, a whoosh of air rushing from them. "I-I-I'm tired of it, of this life. I'm tired of always being on display and always having to put on a show."

Stiles threw his hands up in exasperation. "This was your idea!"

"This was _your_idea," Scott corrected. "And I went along with it." He dropped his head, a scowl pasting itself across his face at how he felt about going along with Stiles's ideas.

"You can't do this to us, man. You can't quit now. We're sold out. The auditorium's packed. You've got—" He waved a hand vaguely in the direction of the theater, "—hundreds, no _thousands_, of people out there, who are waiting to see your show."

For a second, Stiles thought he'd gotten through. He saw Scott's eyebrows go up, the scowl curl into an expression more akin of curiosity than contempt, then Scott's eyes flicked to the mirror over the dressing table and the scowl returned, louder than ever.

A light tapping at the door interrupted the next protest out Scott's mouth. The door swung open and Lydia stepped into the room, clad in her black wetsuit, with her reddish-blonde hair pulled back into a tight pony tail. "I don't care if you're dec-" she started, before she caught at look at Scott's face with his chin set stubbornly. "-ent. You're not ready! Stiles, why isn't he ready? The show starts in ten minutes?"

Stiles dropped his head back bonelessly. "Scott's quit," he informed her.

Lydia frowned. "Again?" She turned back to Scott and eyed him contemplatively, hands akimbo. "It was the photographers, wasn't it? They were taking too many pictures of you. Stiles, what have I told you about not having restrictions on cameras. You know the light from the flashes hurts his eyes." She said the last with a slight pout, like a person commenting on an idiosyncrasy she'd discovered in a pet.

"The light doesn't hurt my eyes," Scott mumbled in return, clearly not amused by her tone.

"Then what is it?" Stiles asked.

Scott clamped his lips together in stubborn silence, but his eyes ticked once again to the mirror. Stiles followed his friend's look. The only thing on the mirror was a photograph that had been used as the basis for one of the theater's largest promotions. It showed a dark-haired teen girl standing with her arms slung around her mother and father, all of them wearing shorts, shirts, bright smiles, and sunburns. They were clearly having the time of their lives. In front of them was posed a seal, its black skin still damp from having just jumped out of the water to get its picture taken. Stiles grabbed the photograph from the mirror and waved it in Scott's face. "This? This is the problem?"

"What?" Lydia asked, peering over Stiles's shoulder, catching his hand in hers to stop the waving long enough that she could see the picture. On recognizing it, she breathed out an "Ohhhh."

"You're mad because she liked you when you were a seal?" Stiles asked, slipping from exasperated to incredulous.

Scott jumped to his feet, grabbing the picture out of Stiles's hand. It crumpled in his grip and he immediately dropped it to the table and started rubbing at the wrinkles, trying to press them out of the paper. "She's out there right now," Scott said, speaking to no one in particular. "I saw her when I came in."

"So, she's a local," Lydia commented, "with a frequent visitor's card."

"We don't _have_a 'frequent visitor's card,'" Stiles replied. "We're not a coffee shop. You don't get free admission to the park after you visited nine times." He brows drew together thoughtfully. Before he could follow that idea to its natural conclusion, Lydia punched him in the arm. "Hey," he protested.

"Focus," she said. "We're on in _five_minutes, now, and our darling Scott is still refusing to put on his skin. We won't need a frequent visitor's card if he doesn't get his butt out there and do the show."

Having apparently salvaged the state of the picture, Scott reverently stuck it back into the mirror's frame. His fingers ghosted over the girl's face one last time before he turned back to his former co-workers. "I'm going to meet her," he informed them. "As myself."

Lydia sucked in a breath at the announcement. Stiles rocked backward on his heels. The room went dead quiet, not even the rumbles of the audience anticipating the pending water show seeping through the walls. Scott's normally tanned skin, which already appeared sallow next to the yellow t-shirt, now looked pale and sallow, and he had an expression like he taken a big bite of coffee grounds.

"Not to be a party pooper," Lydia said, "but technically, she _has_already seen you as yourself."

Stiles cringed. Scott hated to be reminded that the seal form was his natural one. Scott hadn't wanted to talk about the whole selkie thing at all, and was only forced to after Stiles accidentally found the skin that Scott had done an incredibly poor job of hiding in a plastic tub behind the water heater in his basement. And, no, Stiles thought, it wasn't relevant what he had been doing digging through the tubs in Scott's basement to begin with.

"We'll invite her backstage," Stiles burst out. Scott and Lydia's mouths both dropped open, though Lydia reclaimed her poise so quickly that Stiles wouldn't have caught it if he hadn't been watching her. He always had one eye on her.

"W-what?" Scott asked.

"We'll invite her backstage. After the show. You go on and she'll get to see your wonderful performance." _And the show will probably be even better because he'll totally be trying to impress her, which would be even more beautiful. _Stiles could happily visualize what this would do for the park. Having the most famous performing seal in the country would only be the start of their fame. "Then she can come back here and find out all your secrets." He held a finger up, cutting off Scott's predictable protest before his friend could voice it. "Two minutes," he said. "Decide now."

Scott hung his head, his brown hair flopping over his face as he worked through his options. Stiles took that to mean that he had already won. He gave a slight nod to Lydia. She flicked her eyes between them, assessing the next few moves in the argument like it was a chess match. She must have liked the outcome she saw because she turned on her heel and slipped out the door. Stiles could trust her to figure out how to get the show started on time with the least disruption, no matter how creative she had to be about it.

"Fine," Scott relented.

"So you don't quit?" Stiles asked, just to confirm. That the question needled his friend was only an added benefit.

"I don't quit," Scott ground out.

Stiles let the comment hang there. His expression was carefully blank, drawing the moment out until Scott shifted uncomfortably. "Perfect," he finally replied with a grin. "Now get out there and get changed." He watched as Scott trudged toward the still open door, doing his best to hang on to the last bit of defiance, even as they heard Lydia's voice echo over the loudspeakers, announcing the start of the 2:00 pm performance.

He started to follow, then turned back to retrieve the picture. No sense taking this kind of risk if he wasn't sure he had the right person. He paused, studying the photo. Though Scott had done his best to smooth out the wrinkles, a crease cut through the mom's face, making her appear sinister. Fortunately, the important part of the photo was unharmed. The girl was pretty, whatever her name was, though her long, curly hair was too dark for Stiles's taste. With a shake of head, he dragged his thoughts back to reality.

With one last glance at the photo, he set off to find the girl, fighting off a small pit of dread growing in his stomach. When he had convinced Scott to start working for the aquarium and it had _worked_, he'd been sure that he'd used up all the luck he was ever going to have in his life. He crossed his fingers and hoped for the sake his best friend that he had enough luck left to play matchmaker.

END

_A/N: Fulfills AU Bingo squares #22 and #24: **selkies** and **celebrities**__, combined fill._


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